Truly Dreadful Film

The greatest movie ever!

Great Film overall

The movie is wonderful and true, an act of love in all its contradictions and complexity

In Christian Petzold's film 'Yella', a young woman stalked by her husband after leaving him slowly rebuilds her life, and self-respect, through starting a relationship with a criminal businessman. But it's not clear how much of the story is real, and how much is the product of her traumatised mind. In its conclusion, the film resolves this question, and the answer is almost inevitably disappointing; the kick in the tail insufficiently surprising or satisfying. What is good, however, is most of what precedes the ending, as the viewer is drawn into a world intriguingly on the balance of normalcy and the sinister, as seen by a woman herself on the edge. It's nicely underplayed and there's scarcely a wasted scene; it's just a shame that the final resolution has little new to add.

I saw this as part of a European Film Festival at the AFI Silver Spring, MD theater. The festival supposedly gathers some of the best European films, including over ten foreign film entries and the 2007 Palm d'or 4 Months, 3 Weeks, and 2 days. That combined with Nina Hoss winning best actress at Berlin Film Festival, I thought I would see an interesting film. Much to my dismay, I ended up watching a predictable movie that has been done at least a dozen times before. Within the first five minutes of the film, I was able to predict the editing. Part of me spent the next 85 minutes hoping I was wrong about my prediction, sadly I was not. Beyond the predictability of the film, it's also directionless. Overall I found the film to be a waste of time and would not recommend this film.

The movie is well-shot, but in no way does that compensate for a future story. The problem is that there is no good direction in the film. We don't know why Yella separates from her husband, and as such we don't know what she's running away from, nor do we know where she is heading. Usually, not knowing where the film is going is something I enjoy, but here, it all seems pointless, as we don't even know where the character is coming from.The opening sequence, where Ben follows Yella in his car does set a tone, but I think it does not satisfactorily explain why Yella wants to move away from him. To some extent, it doesn't even seem like Yella wants to lose him: at two points Ben breaks into her hotel room, and Yella seems far too acquiescent. One plot hole, at least to me, was how on earth did he manage to get into her hotel room?!? I doubt he just walked up to the reception and asked for the key. Afterwards, Yella doesn't seem to do anything further about it: she doesn't ask for her room to be changed, or even seek advice from anyone.Yella's 'dodgy job' isn't explained well either, all we know is that there are negotiations, and envelopes of money are exchanged. To some extent, this is acceptable, because Yella isn't given any good explanation of what's happening, and so, we can also be left in the dark. But, considering how much of the film seems to take place in fancy boardrooms, some slight revelation, in due time, of what is actually going on would've been appreciated.The two lead characters live in a hotel, and what struck me is that neither of them ever close their doors. This is puzzling, especially considering that Yella is, it would seem, attempting to leave her stalker ex. Even more so when the ex has proved that he is capable of entering her room, even when the door is closed. These hotel doors left ajar did provide for one point where I thought 'now the fun begins', and that is when Yella leaves her room and seeks out her companion. Finally it seemed that she took some initiative and would be in charge of her own life, and not drift around being controlled by others. (To that point, it had always been her companion seeking her out.) Yet, what followed was just a parade of new board rooms, with Yella playing second fiddle.When Yella proclaims her love to her new-found companion, I lost any sympathy I had for her, because it is obvious that she is the typical weak female, falling for 'the bad guy', and she doesn't even try to change her fate. After leaving the stalker bad guy, she falls for the bad guy who steals money from his employer, and seems to hope that all of a sudden life will become better.

Petzold is a very controlled and composed film-maker. In this film, as in GESPENSTER, he uses this almost forensic calm and diurnal realism to explore metaphysical issues. So this film, which ostensibly takes place in the aggressive financial world of mergers and acquisitions, is also a film about death, the soul, and guilt. It is a great challenge to look at these intangible themes through the prism of a very tangible, concrete world - but this Petzold does achieve, with beautifully composed and controlled imagery, and even a nice line in wry, ironic humour. There are some great performances in the film - they draw you part of the way in, but nevertheless there is still some distance between viewer and film. This maybe results in a slightly cold viewing experience, but the film has stayed with me long after its end - it is a complex and highly rewarding work, if mainly in retrospect.